Always Pitch An Idea – Otherwise You’re Just Begging

I got a pitch the other day that, paraphrased, went something like this:

“Hi James,

I’m an experienced blogger, I’ve done [this], I’ve done [that], I’m looking to take on some more freelance writing work, so if you are looking for any new writers, I’d love it if you could give me a try. You can see my CV and portfolio [here] and my personal blog [here].

Thanks!

[Me]”

There were a few issues with this pitch, not the least of which were [this] and [that] were topics that had nothing to do with what I might be interested in assigning. Totally different fields.

But the mistake I want to highlight most, and which I’m sure you’ve already guessed from the headline, is the lack of anything that actually resembles a pitch. Which means this is not actually a pitch. It’s a begging letter.

Any Brits who watched TV in the 80s might know the refrain “Gizza job!”. This kind of pitch ain’t much different.

Why is this a problem? Because you’re asking me, the editor, the guy who gets a dozen pitches a week, far batter than this one, and whom you want to convince to hire you, to choose you over writers I already know and work with, and who send more convincing pitches.

You’re asking me to do a lot of work on your behalf: read your portfolio, think of an idea that might fit your style, write back to you to discuss the idea, which would no doubt entail at least another 2-3 emails to iron out the details, agree fees etc.

All of this makes this a non-starter.

And the cure is simple: pitch an idea. Don’t be lazy. Make my job (in this case, the job of hiring you) as easy and smooth as possible.

Every time you write to an editor, you should be trying to make a sale, which means presenting something worth buying. It would have been so easy for this writer to have spent an extra few minutes coming up with some kind of idea to test the waters, because even if the idea doesn’t fit, it at least gives me a reason to consider you, to actually take the time to dip into your portfolio, possibly to reply to suggest a tweak to your idea or to see what other ideas you have.

“Hi James,

I’m an experienced blogger, I’ve done [this], I’ve done [that], I’m looking to take on some more freelance writing work, so if you are looking for any new writers, I’d love it if you could give me a try.

I recently returned from a trip to Greenland, where I learned how to cook whale soup at Nuuk’s top hotel. Not very PC, but definitely interesting (and smelly). I’d love to write up the experience: “Cooking whales: The definitive Greenland food experience”.

You can see my CV and portfolio [here] and my personal blog [here].

Thanks!

[Me]”

This isn’t a perfect pitch (see here for what that might look like) but it’s infinitely better than the former version. It gives me something to ponder, it stokes my curiosity, at minimum it gives me the impression that, if the idea fits my areas of interest, you have at least made an effort.

Those are qualities of good, professional writers who are worth working with.